Untitled

North Otago Times, 2 December 1910, Page 2

A SCURRILOUS PAMPHLET. There was cause for the anger shown by Sir Joseph Ward in the House on Wednesday afternoon when he made reference to the pamphlet that is being hawked round the country and sold at every fair and show. If we arc to let "the d«ad past Wury its dead'.' wherefore the need for stirring up the decaying bones of the long ago ? Jf every individual in the community were confronted with his Past misdeeds, trivial and otherwise, many would feel particularly uncomfortable ; but communities and individuals have agreed, fl s the poet advises, to'''let the dead past bury its dead," and each is therefore lenient to his neighbor's faults and failings;'lf it were not so the world would be hardly worth living in. Politically wc are opponents; to the salient features of Sir Joseph Ward's policy, hut we have.no scruples in describing the two pamphlets that have issued from the gutter in reference to Sir Joseph .Ward as the dirtiest things of the kind tbiat have yet been printed in New Zealand. A writer who, from behind the shelter of a hedge, fires at his enemy, in ordinary newspaper correspondence can' be excused c«n the ground of the public interest; tut the ghoul who proceeds to the cemetery of what should he the long forgotten past, and begins to turn over the hones of his victims is a very fit subject for execration. We have not read . the pamphlets, but we arc aware of their conterts, irnd we are sure that all shades of political opinion will condemn the spirit in which they are written, and the purpose for which . they were written, the; attack on Sir Joseph Ward is an execrable production; tmt fuither than that, tho gutter has been raked through to find material to throw at his family. Nothing so utterly despicable has appeared in print in thei Dominion, Furthermore, most of what the pamphlets contain ■ is utterly untrue. It lias been sought to 'attach to some members of the Opposition the discredit of having , brought the pamphlet into existence, but those who make the statement know • very well that it is erroneous. No member ' of Parliament, whatever Ms politics may be, would soil his hands with thin'gu like j those.referred to. We have criticised ] Sir Joseph Ward's administration in \ hostile spirit, but in. respect to ';li3 sort of. thing. that Is contained ■'tyitne p-.mphlets we can only express sympthy that Sir Joseph' Ward

and his 'family should bo called upon to.submit to' attacks: that are ne'tWcr coi-dciiod -by the fact .that they: bear airy resemblance to'.the truth nor to a certain measure of -the good taste that ir< expected froni even the lowest of writers. :